Vanilla eroticism is known for its predictable plots. Romantics call them happy-ever-afters. Someone’s manly chest meets someone else’s perfect skin and only the names change from story to story. The outcomes are expected. Clichés are guaranteed. Couples find their right type of Utopia by The End. Nice. While some readers love the comfort of inevitability, others don’t mind a challenging alternative that goes down a slightly different route.
Neo-noir erotica is edgier than its soft counterparts. It can be arousing but unsettling. This narrative rarely takes a formulaic path or coats itself in gloss. Sex comes from a place of lust, driven by a need to feed an inner animal. Justice; righteousness‘, good-over-evil; a love-that-conquers-all — plots don’t fit this genre well. If you look for a HEA you may find it but not where you’d expect it. You’d need to skew your head to get a better look.
When writing SEETHINGS, I lured the reader into the story with a conventional approach to eroticism and then reshaped it as it progressed. At first, the characters move in expected unison, feeding off their lusts and passions while pushing small boundaries. They, devour each other — but then one oversteps the mark and a shadow climbs into bed with them. Something is wrong. Euphoria is matched only by great darkness.
Every word was crafted to bring our lover’s bodies close while keeping their minds apart. I used their inner desires as gravity but their long-term objectives as deterrents. I’m proud of how sophisticated it turned out to be, how deadly it turned. My toes curl a little thinking about it. The challenge was adding a special third character to disrupt things. That shadow I mentioned earlier? This is the menace that needed proper sculpting. Working it into the couple’s intimacy wasn’t easy. The ending is happy — for a mostly unknown, unseen protagonist. Watch for it when it comes! Don’t forget to skew your head a little!
Read SEETHINGS now to unsettle all your thoughts on classic erotica.
–M
